Monday, 29 June 2015

The lessons for Class 5, the last in our course, are now available on the course website:

https://weka.waikato.ac.nz/moredataminingwithweka The 6 lessons in Class 5 addresses some important miscellaneous issues. Two are devoted to neural networks, both the simple Perceptron and multilayer Perceptrons — sometimes called “connectionist” models. Then we consider that perennial question, “how much data is enough?”, and show how to answer it using learning curves. Next we look at how to optimise the parameters of learning algorithms, and finally we return to the very beginning and re-visit the ARFF format, including some useful features that haven’t yet been encountered.

The post-course assessment is also now open. The videos, slides and transcripts will remain available at YouTube, Youku and the "Materials" site:

We aim to run both the introductory course “Data Mining with Weka” and “More Data Mining with Weka” again, but are not yet sure when. As for a possible third course, “Advanced Data Mining with Weka”, that’s still under consideration: there’s no schedule yet.

Monday, 22 June 2015

In this class we'll learn about two topics: attribute selection and cost-sensitive classification. Automatic selection of an attribute subset is a powerful way of getting both good results and simpler, easily explainable, models from machine learning; indeed you will end up achieving stunning results with a tiny subset of attributes on a document classification task. And taking the costs of different kinds of error into account is essential in many practical applications.

Next week is the last. Pretty soon you will be an expert in data mining and the use of Weka!

Monday, 15 June 2015

The mid-course assessment is also now available. Do it when you have finished Class 2 (although it will remain open for the rest of the course). The final assessment will appear during week 5.

Check your Profile to ensure that your assessment marks have been recorded correctly. Also, check that the name in your Profile is the one you want on your Statement of Completion: as we will use that exact text for the Statements.

My goal is to enable you to learn as much as possible from this course, and I recognize that doing the assessments may not be a priority for you. However, our ability to mount follow-up MOOCs will depend on the success of this one as perceived by my University -- and the number of people who complete it successfully will be a key metric. Thus I urge you to do the assessments for my sake, if not your own :-)

cheers, and keep going! Weeks 3 and 4 are the central part of this course.

Monday, 8 June 2015

The mid-course assessment, following Class 2, is also available. Following that, there are 3 weeks to go (classes 3, 4 and 5).

The activities are a crucial part of the course: they're where most people will do their actual learning! However, they do not form part of the assessment, so don't be scared to get wrong answers. Also, some of the activities are pretty difficult and time-consuming. You don't necessarily need to actually complete them if you find that difficult on your computer, but you do need to understand what it is that you are supposed to do -- and why.

"More Data Mining with Weka" has been designed so that participants at many different levels can learn as much as possible – and complete the course successfully. You don't have to do the reading. All you must do to succeed are the mid-course and final assessments -- which you can try as often as you like. The mid-course assessment will remain open for the rest of the course; the final assessment will appear during week 5.

The videos and other course components for Classes 1 and 2 can be downloaded from the "Materials" site, in case you find that more convenient than viewing them online: